Monday, August 18, 2014

Family Home Evening With The Gringa

Hello familyyy! :)

Sounds like
everyone is ready for school to start :) Well, except for Tyson. But he’s never
ready so that’s no surprise ;) I really can’t believe it’s already time for
school to start though. SO crazy! This week was a good one over here as
well :) We've been busy, but that’s how we like it :)

We only had one
intercambio this week and I was with Hermana Ballard. She’s from Las Vegas and
adorable! We had lots of fun :) I love intercambios. Especially with my gringas
:)

Sandra was also
confirmed yesterday so that was great :) She is so happy. Her ex, Joel, isn’t
so happy though haha. Oooops. Now he knows he can’t live with her and she doesn’t
want to get married now. Last night we were over at their house and he was over
there seeing his kids and walked downstairs, looked at us, and walked out the
door. Yep. Poor guy ;) One day he'll see that Hermana Sandra did the right
thing.

Jorge Louis is
also progressing... Well, was progressing. He was ready to be baptized and
everything! All he had to do was pray and see if the 30th of August was the
right day. And he didn’t pray.... So we told him to pray again. But then we
went to church yesterday and he wasn’t there and his friend told us,
"Jorge doesn’t want you two to talk about baptism. He wants to learn more
but he’s not ready to be baptized yet." AHHH. Freak. We have a lesson with
him tonight though so we'll see :) If he doesn’t want to be baptized, that’s
his choice. We'll do all we can to help him though :)

Mariel is also having
problems. Her baby is super sick and so is she. She weighs like less than 100
pounds and won’t eat! And her baby is sick as well so she can’t leave the house
with her which means she hasn’t come to church. She told us yesterday she
thinks she needs to wait till September to be baptized. She’s still great and
excited about everything, but right now she’s dealing with a lot. We've been
praying that her baby can get better so she can come to church.

We've also been
working with a less active, Dana. We always are over at her house for lunch on
the weekends with her aunt, Elisa. (She cooks the best food EVER. Well, besides
you, mom....) And she has problems with some of the girls in the ward. We all
know how girls can be sometimes.... Yeah. So she doesn’t wanna come to church,
but yesterday she finally came!! And every single one of the people her age
completely ignored her. What the heck?! She left and when we went over later
for lunch, she had been crying because she felt so bad. Stinkin girls! Why do
they have to be so clicky? It’s really sad to see, but her testimony is super
strong. Hopefully it gets better.

This week we had a
talent show too :) That was super fun! Let me just say, us missionaries are
hilarious ;) (And super humble too...) We did two little acting number things.
(Yeah, I forgot the word in English so hopefully you understand.) You'll have
to wait for the videos but it was fun. I played the part of the dumb gringa who
doesn’t know Spanish. Imagine that! haha. It was a fun time. Some of the youth
played their boxes too. Yep that’s right. A box is an instrument here and its
sweet! It was a fun time though. There’s another talent show Friday but for the
stake so we will definitely be there :)

Yesterday we had a
cool experience. Here we live with the G. S. family. They’re
less actives. There’s Jose, Julia, J. and I. (they’re evil) and she has
a special needs boy, V. They just frustrate me sometimes! They’re such
a great family, but just don’t have the determination to go to church. (Kinda
like our family a few years ago haha) But it’s just ironic. They live with
missionaries and don’t go to church! So we decided we are going to be the
missionaries to activate them, and that is that. We've been working hard with
them, and they started coming to church, but an hour late. So yesterday we were
just like whatever, someone else can worry about picking up our investigators.
We ARE going to get them to church. So we woke up and made pancakes, and got
them all ready to go. It was great :) Annnnd then her husband was just getting
in the shower as we were walking out the door. (Kinda like dad would always do
when we wanted to go somewhere... Always the last to shower and get ready....)
So we had to leave without them. They showed up late, but made it through
almost all of sacrament. They walked in as I was giving my talk (They always
make the missionaries talk in sacrament!) but they made it :)

Then in Relief
Society, the teacher called on Julia (she’s our pensionista) to share her
testimony about eternal marriage. Her and her husband were sealed but stopped
going to church. And as she was sharing her testimony, she got SO emotional.
She made me cry, the little bugger! She was like, "I know I’m up here for
a reason. The missionaries know it too. I know the church is true and eternal
marriage is important, but I’ve just let things get in the way. I know I don’t
attend church like I should, but I know God has blessed me with an amazing
family." It was so great! It was amazing to see that our work paid off and
that she had such a spiritual experience. If we wouldn’t have gotten up and
made them go, she would have missed out on such an amazing experience
yesterday. It was so great. As much as they frustrate us, we really love them
so much. And as much as we want to kill J. and I., we love them too
:)

So funny story.
Last night we had FHE with the Cisneros Family. We ended with a game and guess
who lost? The gringa, of course. So I had a punishment. And they all decided it
would be funny if I ran up and down the street yelling, "TE AMO
ROJAS!" which is, "I love you Rojas." Who is Rojas you may ask?
Another Elder in the ward. :/ NOT funny guys. Not funny. But I did it. And
everyone stopped what they were doing to watch the gringa running up the street
like a crazy person. And everyone ended up crying because they were laughing so
hard. I’ve never seen Hermana Luz laugh so hard and Michelli just kept saying,
"How embarrassing!" Yeah. You’re tellin me, girlfriend. SO
embarrassing. I always lose when we play games here. So not fair. It’s also on
video so you all can look forward to seein that one :(

Hmmmm I’m not sure
much more happened this week. It was a good week :) My testimony grows every
single week, and I learn so much more every week. I love you all SO much :)
Have a great week!